The "Middle East and Terrorism" Blog was created in order to supply information about the implication of Arab countries and Iran in terrorism all over the world. Most of the articles in the blog are the result of objective scientific research or articles written by senior journalists.

From the Ethics of the Fathers: "He [Rabbi Tarfon] used to say, it is not incumbent upon you to complete the task, but you are not exempt from undertaking it."

Wednesday, August 31, 2016

Deja vu and the coming PA elections - Elliott Abrams

The unpopularity of the
Palestinian Authority and the ruling Fatah Party due to corruption,
‎incompetence, and growing repression helps explain why West Bank voters
might choose ‎Hamas

Municipal
elections are scheduled for October 8 in the West Bank and Gaza. Hamas
has ‎reversed its previous position and is now participating, and may
win -- not as Hamas, per se, ‎but by putting forth "fellow traveler"
candidates known to be close to Hamas. The elections ‎will likely be
close.‎

The unpopularity of the
Palestinian Authority and the ruling Fatah Party due to corruption,
‎incompetence, and growing repression helps explain why West Bank voters
might choose ‎Hamas. In other cases voters may prefer Hamas' Islamism
to Fatah's brand of ‎secularism -- or may prefer Hamas' manifest desire
to kill Israelis over Fatah's and the PA's ‎tamer stance. And there is
another factor: In many areas Hamas is presenting a single ‎candidate
while the non-Hamas vote is split among rival contenders. As The Times
of Israel ‎reported about Hebron:‎

"These are the first
elections in more than a decade in which voting is taking place at the
‎same time in both Gaza and the West Bank, and Hamas and Fatah are going
head-to-‎head. ... As in the other cities in the West Bank, the trouble
in Hebron is that because there ‎are so many secular slates of
candidates, there is a reasonable chance that the more ‎moderate camp of
Fatah and groups of its ilk will split the secular vote, paving the way
for ‎victory by Hamas candidates.‎"

Deja vu all over again,
as Yogi Berra is said to have said. In the 2006 Palestinian
‎parliamentary elections, most of these same conditions existed and the
result was a narrow ‎Hamas victory in the popular vote (44 to 41%) that
produced a much larger Hamas ‎majority in parliament (74 to 45).‎

There is one difference
from 2006 that is very much worth mentioning. The myth exists ‎that the
United States forced the Palestinians to hold those elections over the
objections of ‎the PA leadership. That's false (as I explained at length
in my book about Bush ‎administration policy toward the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict, "Tested by Zion"). In fact, the
‎Palestinians had held a successful presidential election in January
2005 whose purpose was ‎to establish the legitimacy of Mahmoud Abbas as
Yasser Arafat's successor. They wanted ‎parliamentary elections, again
to strengthen Fatah's legitimacy, and were confident they ‎would win. We
did not force them to hold the 2006 elections. Today, at least that
argument ‎is over: No one is claiming that these elections of 2016 are
being demanded by the United ‎States and imposed by the Obama
administration on a reluctant PA leadership.‎

But the similarities to
2006 are very striking, including the most fundamental one: allowing ‎a
terrorist group, Hamas, to contest the election without the slightest
nod to stopping its ‎terror or giving up its rule of Gaza. This is wrong
for many reasons, but here are the top two. ‎First, Hamas may win power
in a number of West Bank cities but Fatah will not be able to ‎contest
elections as freely in Gaza. In this sense the dice are loaded, or to
mix ‎metaphors, Hamas can say heads I win in the West Bank and tails you
lose in Gaza. Second, ‎those who wish to contest elections should be
forced to choose between bullets and ballots. ‎This is what happened in
the Northern Ireland agreements, where the Irish Republican Army had to
end its ‎guerrilla and terrorist war and could then run for office. It
is a mistake with global ‎implications to allow terrorist groups to have
it all: to run for office like peaceful parties, but ‎continue their
violent activities. That was the mistake we made in 2006, and it is
being ‎repeated.‎

There is an argument
for holding these elections, of course, and a powerful one. There have
‎been no parliamentary or presidential elections in the West Bank and
Gaza since 2006 and ‎these elections provide at least a taste of
democracy. They will tell us a good deal about ‎Palestinian public
opinion. And perhaps in some cases they will produce better, meaning
‎more responsive and competent, municipal governments. But perhaps their
clearest ‎achievement will be to show that nothing has changed since
2006 and indeed for decades ‎more: Fatah and Hamas are implacably at
odds, Palestinians are split, the Palestinian ‎‎"national" government
and national movement are hopelessly divided, Hamas' brand of
‎rejectionism and terror remains widely popular, and a negotiated peace
agreement between ‎Israel and the Palestinians is nowhere in sight.‎

Well, one thing has
changed since 2006: Abbas is 10 years older and his time in office is
‎closer to its end. Until succession issues are dealt with, the notion
of serious Israeli-‎Palestinian negotiations is completely unrealistic
-- whatever happens at the United Nations, ‎whatever the French suggest or the Russians try, and whatever the Obama administration ‎or its successor believe.‎

Elliott Abrams is a senior fellow for Middle
East Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. This piece is
reprinted from Abrams' blog "Pressure Points."Source: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=17045 Follow Middle East and Terrorism on TwitterCopyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.